The scalpel is a necessary tool for surgical operation and its safety is extremely important to healthcare workers and patients. A conventional scalpel usually consists of two types: one type is a plastic handled scalpel and the other is steel handled scalpel. The plastic handled scalpel mainly consists of a disposable blade and disposable plastic handle. The plastic handle is provided with a blade holder at its front part and the blade is installed on the blade holder. The steel handled scalpel mainly consists of a disposable blade and reusable steel handle and it's necessary to install the blade onto the handle before use and remove the blade from handle after use. Whether the plastic handled scalpel or steel handled scalpel, the user is subject to the potential injury caused by an exposed or contaminated blade during normal use of the instrument, or when passing the exposed scalpel to the colleague.
In order to improve safety, existing surgical scalpels have been designed incorporating the concept of carrying a shield. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,626,925B2 discloses an invention patent application titled Shielded Surgical Scalpel applied by American BD Company (Becton, Dickinson Company), which belongs to a shielded plastic handled surgical scalpel. Also, for example, European patent EP0988832A2 discloses an invention patent application titled Surgical Scalpel applied by American BD Company (Becton, Dickinson Company), which belongs to a shielded steel handled scalpel. Although this kind of sliding sleeve type surgical scalpel applying the shield structure solves the safety problem caused by the exposed blade, it has not fundamentally solved the safety problem of potential re-use of the scalpel, since it remains possible to open the shield after the open and closing sequence of normal use.
Therefore, it's urgently necessary to invent a kind of safe and reliable scalpel, which could overcome the above described disadvantages of scalpels in prior art and serve the medical care industry better.